Well looking at the growing rivalry between Obama and Clinton, I would say that Obama will win enough delegates to wrap up the nomination, but Hillary will steal it with the Superdelegates.  This in turn will piss off the black voters who support Obama, and they will turn out and vote for McCain to defeat Hillary again.  Watch and see.

  My main concern is this carpetbagging phony named Al Franken.  Why he came to Minnesota to run for Senate is still quite a mystery to me.  I think he just needed a job or some other mundane way to make a buck.  He has no character, no leadership qualities, no personality, and not a clue what politics or Congress is all about.  But I will continue to look into this nut job and see what I can find, outside of what I have already posted here.

  First lets look at his now defunct political action committee.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080319/ap_on_el_pr/obama_iraq;_ylt=AoycOJ44dRl6QMpC9YIrloGs0NUE

That's what Barak Hussein Obama said today.

Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley’s energy administration is proposing one of the most ambitious yet costly energy conservation packages, including goals to reduce electricity consumption by 15% and to mandate state utility companies to purchase 20% of their energy from solar, wind and other renewable fuels by 2022. If the companies do not, the fines will be doubled. O’Malley believes a cap-and-trade system will generate enough revenue to provide incentives for electricity users to conserve and use more energy efficient appliances.

Legislators, state or national, should be wary of implementing cap-and-trade systems to reduce emissions. Cap-and-trade schemes often have volatile prices, and any revenue generated for consumer incentive as a result of a cap-and-trade system is ultimately paid for by the consumer through higher electricity costs. In fact, Allegheny Power in Maryland recently sent energy efficient light bulbs to customers, and while many figured the bulbs to be a ‘free sample’, a subsequent surcharge appeared on all the customers’ energy bills without any warning.

Mandating certain percentages for renewable fuels further exacerbates the proposed legislation since renewables cannot compete with other sources of energy. As Ben Lieberman notes, renewable sources of energy have been receiving preferential treatment for years with unproven results. One source of energy that has proven results and already plays an integral role in Maryland’s energy portfolio is nuclear energy. Providing Maryland with almost 30% of its energy, nuclear energy is proven to be clean, safe and affordable. Yet, Governor O’Malley completely neglects nuclear in his energy plan. If emissions free energy without a significant cost to the consumer is what O’Malley desires, he would be remiss not to include nuclear.

Economists Stephen Dubner and Steven Levitt, renowned for their book Freakonomics and NY Times blog, have a certain knack for examining the hidden incentives, opportunity costs and unintended consequences of real-world issues using sound economic logic. They have also advocated the development of commercial nuclear energy on more than one occasion.

In today’s Freakonomics post, they note the opportunity costs of forgoing nuclear power, highlighting the obituary of Dr. Herbert J.C. Kouts, a nuclear power safety expert. In a commissioner’s report for the governor of New York in 1983, he claimed:

All careful analysis confirms that the risk of nuclear power is small. The chance of a large accident is very low, and consequences of such an accident would be substantially less than most people think.”

A year later, he commented on the misaligned incentives between the nuclear industry and the government. In essence, private companies investing in nuclear energy lost billions of dollars because the anti-nuclear movement convinced the government and public at large that commercial nuclear energy was too dangerous. Surely, the government wasn’t pulling for the industry to fail; after all, nuclear is a clean, affordable source of energy that diversifies the nation’s energy portfolio. Nevertheless, the incentives for the government to see the nuclear industry succeed were much lower than the actual industry itself.

In a previous column, Dubner and Levitt discuss risk versus uncertainty in terms of nuclear energy versus global warming. The fact that risk is calculated and uncertainty is not may bode well for the future nuclear industry. They ask:

Could it be that nuclear energy, risks and all, is now seen as preferable to the uncertainties of global warming?”

(More on risk and uncertainty here.)

On aligning incentives for public acceptance:

There was a time when people didn’t want new prisons built in their backyards — until they decided that the risk was relatively low and that the rewards, in jobs and tax dollars, were substantial. Will nuclear plants ultimately get the same embrace? The markets seem to think so.”

The Wall Street Journal reports on a case of Nataline Sarkisyan, a 17-year-old who died of leukemia after health insurer Cigna Corp. rejected coverage for a liver transplant. John Edwards is using the story to push his proposal for a universal, government-run health care plan. Speaking at an Edwards campaign rally, the girl’s father said of Cigna, “They killed my daughter.”  

It is always tragic when a young person dies. But Edwards is engaging in pure demagoguery when he implies that a government-run system would give everyone access to every medical procedure. When supply is limited and demand is unlimited, someone will have to draw the line on who gets what. As one comment notes on the WSJ Health Blog,  

At the margins, there is always going to be some procedure that doesn’t make sense to the insurer, but makes perfect sense to the emotionally tied family. How would the government make these decisions? How would it be better than it is now? 

As other comments note, organs are in short supply. There is no reason to believe that Nataline could have received a transplant in time or that she was more deserving than other patients with higher chances of survival. Numerous experts say there is little evidence to suggest the transplant would have been safe or effective. Cigna’s chief medical officer is correct when he says, “It is highly unlikely that any health-care insurance system, nationally or internationally, would have covered this procedure.” 

With his rhetoric on health care, Edwards borders on promising a world without death. Then again, as both a politician and a trial lawyer, Edwards is no stranger to exploiting tragedies for his own political and financial gain. In 2004, he declared, “…when John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk, get up out of that wheelchair and walk again.” 

Edwards’ “solution” is simply to have government bureaucrats make decisions about coverage instead of employers and insurance companies. But why not have individuals and families make the key decisions about their health care? In addition to many other advantages of consumer-driven market (such as lower prices), more people would likely have the option of purchasing excess coverage to pay for extraordinary endeavors.

The New Year brought a new high in the price of a barrel of oil, hitting $100 for the first time in history. While the price fell slightly below $100 shortly after, economists must deal with a number of unpredictable variables when attempting to predict the future price of oil.

Surging demand, particularly in China and India, the IAEA’s predicted impact of slowing economic growth on demand, and uncertainty of global supplies caused by geopolitical tensions offer little hope in predicting whether the price of oil will rise or fall in the future. The unpredictability does suggest, however, that the United States is strengthening its push for energy independence and diversification.

As espoused by Dr. Stuart Butler and Dr. Kim Holmes, U.S. energy policy should emphasize the following:

• Unleashing free enterprise,
• Protecting America’s energy interests, and
• Advancing free global energy markets.

Where do we get our oil? Using The Heritage Foundation’s Index of Economic Freedom, 36% of imports come from mostly unfree nations while 19% of imports come from repressed nations.

Nevertheless,

Reducing oil imports from unstable or unfriendly regimes should be done in a way that minimizes the economic cost to Americans. The first steps in reducing reliance on foreign oil are to make full use of domestic petroleum reserves and to remove disincentives to investment in oil production from friendly nations. These should be coupled with efforts to encourage diversification away from petroleum, which will be best achieved not by government fiat, but by the private sector–led development of alternatives that can compete in their own right.”

Energy will undoubtedly be a hot button issue again in 2008, and consumers worldwide have growing concerns about rising prices. Increased global energy demand and constant geopolitical threats could pave the way to even steeper prices, but the free market and private enterprise have the ability to meet America’s energy needs in a more cost efficient manner.

The Treasury Department today released a study outlining several approaches to business tax reform. Many countries are modifying business tax systems to improve their global competitiveness. As the report notes, the U.S. cannot afford to fall behind. The study offers no recommendations, but is meant to provide substance for discussion.  Along that line, below are links to Heritage research papers on business tax reform: 

• Daniel J. Mitchell, Ph.D., writes that a flat “will make America a magnet for investment and job creation,” among its many other benefits. Also, even The World Bank has endorsed low tax rates and simple tax systems.

• As noted by Mitchell and David C. John, eliminating the double taxation of dividends could single-handedly increase the nation’s supply of capital by nearly 1 percent.

• The U.S. currently taxes American-based compa­nies on their worldwide income. This policy subjects U.S. companies that compete in global markets to higher tax rates than those paid by companies based in other nations.

Forbes reports the findings of a new OMB study: The federal deficit for 2007 would have been 69.2 percent higher if the government used the same accounting methods as private companies. Under corporate accounting methods, costs are recorded when expenses are incurred rather than when they are paid.  If such unpaid liabilities were counted, the deficit would be $275.5 billion instead of the $162.8 reported. Even the higher figure fails to account for the money borrowed from the Social Security trust fund and an estimated $36.8 billion in environmental clean-up efforts. 

So-called accrual accounting is used by the private sector because it forces firms to recognize and plan for future obligations—something the federal government could benefit from, writes Alison Acosta Fraser.

Aspirin is not good medicine for a brain tumor, even if the tumor causes a headache. It may do a little for the symptom, but nothing for the tumor. That’s obvious, but in the domain of fiscal policy, many are quick to focus on short-term symptoms rather than the underlying disease.

To label the federal budget deficit a “problem” is to focus on a symptom; acting to cure it is just like asking the doctor to medicate that bad headache away. A good physician will instead diagnose the cause of the symptom before considering treatment.

If the deficit is a bit of a headache, it’s not a particularly bad one-at least not today. The chart below shows the federal deficit-the amount the government spends each year above what it collects-as a percentage of the economy, as measured by GDP. Percentage of GDP is a useful way to put budgetary numbers in context. As the chart shows, the deficit today is pretty unremarkable, just a hair above the 45-year average. (In fact, the government’s latest numbers show that the deficit today is actually below the historical average.) Another measure: interest payments on the national debt, which is the accumulation of all those deficits, total under 2 percent of GDP.

But that’s not the end of the story. Starting in about 2015, the deficit, as a percentage of the economy, begins to skyrocket, according to government projections. The national debt also climbs, and with it, interest payments grow, putting further pressure on the budget. In short order, deficit spending will swamp the federal budget.

Attempting to diagnose the cause of this calamity, one might consider what will change between now and 2015-just as a doctor might ask a patient to remember whether she made any changes, perhaps a change in diet, around the time her headaches started. These clues can help us rule in and rule out certain maladies.

Looking at the spending projections in the chart below, a few changes are evident: the bands representing Medicare, Social Security, and Medicaid have grown quite thicker than they were before and are projected to keep expanding. Meanwhile, Defense and “Other Spending,” which includes nearly all of the pork projects and domestic spending that lawmakers ponder, have shrunk a bit to comprise an even smaller portion of the national economy.

The steep pitch of the graph reveals the disease: driven by the big entitlement programs, federal spending is set to grow to unprecedented levels. Assuming that tax collections remain more or less where they’ve been for the past 50 years, the result will be gaping deficits.

This is a scary disease. Like an untreated brain tumor, entitlement spending is left to grow on autopilot each year, consuming an ever-larger portion of our economy. If paid for with tax hikes, this entitlement behemoth will sap the economy’s resources and its vigor, imperiling the health and welfare of younger workers today and their children and grandchildren. Attempting to treat the symptom, deficits, in that way would actually harm the patient. The way to treat the disease, and help the patient, is to rein in spending on these programs.

Today, the deficit symptoms are small. But the tumor is growing rapidly beneath the surface and soon deficits will be very large. These coming deficits are the symptom that warns us of the disease: the entitlement spending explosion. Ignored or treated improperly, that disease could kill the patient.

geovisit();(Note: This post is a part of the Facing Up Blog Carnival.)

It is becoming common knowledge that America is heading toward an unprecedented budget crisis. The question now is what to do about it. To explore that question, www.facingup.org is hosting a blog carnival today.   

Federal spending will grow much faster than revenues in the coming decades. Over the next 50 years, the gap between promised payouts and expected revenues is estimated to be $50 trillion. Raising taxes is one option for closing that gap. However, the economic and social consequences of that approach would be debilitating.  

Drastic tax increases will be necessary if entitlement programs are not reformed. Today, taxes consume 18.3 percent of GDP. By 2050, that figure would rise by two-thirds to 30 percent of GDP. Throw in the cost of state and local taxes, and American workers would shoulder a tax burden comparable to that in present-day Europe.  

The European social model is not one that Americans should want to emulate. Highly-taxed European economies are marked by sluggish growth and high unemployment. Aggregate statistics that suggest otherwise are actually skewed by a handful of countries that have adopted lower taxes and other market-based reforms. Young Americans visiting Europe are often struck by the number of college-educated Europeans in their 20s and 30s who live with their parents and work low-paying jobs (as tour guides, servers, etc). Although there is nothing wrong with such jobs, it seems pointless to have a “free” college education if there is no job market in which to make use of it.     

It’s not just about money. A faltering economy is responsible for Europe’s decline as a civilization as well. For example, 85 percent of Italian men aged 18–33 live with their parents. One reason they do so is the crummy job market and the high cost of living on one’s own. Experts are now worrying that this trend is responsible for the drastic decline of Italy’s birth rate. In many European countries, high taxes deter even married couples from assuming the costs of children. Also, a poor economy has made Europeans more pessimistic about the future. According to a recent poll, four out of five French respondents and nearly three out of four Germans believe that the next generation in their countries will be worse off than the current one.  

Lack of opportunity and pessimistic attitudes can manifest in a number of harmful ways besides a falling birthrate. In France, economic malaise has contributed to civil unrest. The rioting in Paris ghettos is driven mostly by unemployed young men with nothing better to do.   

What is happening in Europe is not a new story. Tax policy has played a pivotal role in the rise and fall of many civilizations. It’s not too late for Europe, but change will be painful for them because the system is so ingrained. The United States is in a better position because of its relatively strong economy, a more self-reliant culture, and the time remaining before the bulk of Baby Boomers retire.  

Policymakers must concentrate on structural reforms to entitlement programs and the health care system that encourage individual responsibility. The “solution” of tax raises would mean following Europe down the road of civilizational decline.

Note: This post is being submitted to the Facing Up Blog Carnival on the $9 trillion debt.

Make no mistake: Without entitlement reform, drastic tax increases will be necessary to cover the cost of future retirees. Politicians dodge this reality by proposing various “quick fixes” to address the entitlement crunch. Below is a list of the most popular “quick fixes” for raising revenue—and why they won’t work.  

Repealing the Bush Tax Cuts. The Bush tax cuts did not lower tax levels by historical standards. Tax revenues are consuming 18.3 percent of GDP—which is about average for the past 50 years—and are projected to rise in any case. According to the CBO, federal tax reve­nues will climb to record levels even if the Bush tax cuts are made permanent and the growing impact of the alternative minimum tax is curtailed.  Furthermore, higher tax rates do not necessarily translate into higher tax revenues. Income tax rates have varied widely since the 1960s, yet income tax revenues have generally been sta­ble at less than 10 percent of GDP. The reason is that higher tax rates slow economic growth and increase tax avoidance—a fact not taken into a account by current projections. The CBO assumes that real GDP will grow by about 2 percent annually, whether the tax burden remains at 18.3 percent of GDP or increases to 24 percent. That is a deeply flawed assumption.  

Improving Economic Growth. The Government Accountability Office (GAO) estimates that it would require real (inflation-adjusted) annual economic growth in the double-digit range every year for the next 75 years to close the fiscal gap through growth alone. Considering that real economic growth has averaged only about 3 percent annually over the past 30 years, that strategy is a pipe dream.  

Closing the tax gap. The difference between what the IRS estimates is owed and what it actually collects is around $290 billion annually. Spending on Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid will increase by 10.3 percent of GDP between now and 2050. Therefore, closing the tax gap would account for only about 2.2 percent of GDP.  Even if it were possible (which it isn’t), closing the tax gap would have serious costs and consequences. Tax compliance is relatively high at 84 percent, and most compliance problems result from honest mistakes. Raising compliance would require invasive enforcement measures that would likely create a public backlash against IRS abuses. Also, the economic costs of complying with burdensome new reporting requirements could cancel out any resulting tax gains.     

Raising the Social Security payroll tax. Currently, workers pay the Social Security payroll tax on the first $97,500 of their annual income. This “wage cap” is indexed to the growth of real wages and increases every year. Some politicians want to eliminate or increase the cap, thereby raising taxes on “wealthier” Americans. However, a 2003 study by the Social Security Administration showed that eliminating wage cap would delay the program’s deficits for only about six years. That action would also weaken the economy and hurt the middle class. According to an analysis by Investor’s Business Daily, an annual tax increase in excess of 25 percentage points on those earning over $200,000 would be necessary to bring in enough money to close Social Security’s expected $2 trillion shortfall. Also, raising the payroll tax now would not make any difference for future retirees. Since Congress spends the entire surplus anyway, raising the tax would simply—in the words of the the Concord Coalition’s Robert Bixby—“build up a bigger stack of IOUs.” 

Note: This post is being submitted to the Facing Up Blog Carnival on the $9 trillion debt.

First, Greenpeace founder Patrick Moore. This time it’s journalist, author, and former No Nukes protestor Gwyneth Cravens espousing the need for nuclear power. Her new book, Power to Save the World: The Truth about Nuclear Energy, thoroughly details the benefits of commercial nuclear energy and dispels the myths. In the preface she says,

When I began my research eight years ago, I’d assumed that we had many choices in the way we made electricity. But we don’t. Nuclear power is the only large-scale, environmentally-benign, time-tested technology currently available to provide clean electricity.”

While Cravens continues to push the green agenda, she completely understands the importance and necessity of nuclear. With higher energy demands and policy makers pressing for environmentally friendly energy as well as less energy dependence, nuclear energy should not be overlooked or dismissed for the reason of fear.

In an interview with Wired, Cravens addresses some of the fears people have concerning nuclear power. When asked about the number of people directly harmed by nuclear power, she replied:

It’s zero in the United States. Of course there is the occasional industrial accident amongst the workers. But over the lifetime cycle of nuclear power, if you go cradle-to-grave with uranium, the total carbon emissions are about those of wind power.”

On the effects of Chernobyl and Three-Mile Island:

Chernobyl’s reactor had no containment building. If they had had that reactor in a containment dome, we wouldn’t be talking about it the way we are. We had a Chernobyl in the United States, it was called Three Mile Island. But you have to look at risk and benefit, and you have to do comparisons. Three Mile Island really scared people, partly because it was so badly bungled by nuclear industry and regulatory commissions. The psychological effects were real, but in a dozen independent studies, no health effects have been found as a result of the Three Mile Island event. Radiation was never a risk at Three Mile Island. People in New Mexico, every day of their lives, get from nature maybe 100 or 300 times more exposure than citizens around Three Mile Island got during that event.”

Finally, concerning nuclear waste:

First of all, it’s small in volume. Uranium is dense, so the waste is dense. The waste from one average reactor, the spent fuel, per year could fit in the back of a standard pickup truck. This small volume of nuclear waste is always shielded, always isolated, transported in thick casks. Radiation is stopped by a few inches of steel and concrete and water and so on.”

Undoubtedly, exposing the realities and benefits of nuclear power from the veil of ignorance is imperative for the success of commercial nuclear energy. Cravens’ book focuses on the predispositions of nuclear energy and provides a powerful message for all those wanting to understand the truth and diminish their fear. As Nobel Prize winning chemist and physicist
Marie Curie said:

Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.”